N-tier design

We are in the position of developing a subapplication on the AS/400 that will
initially use 5250 terminals (or emulators), but that we want to be extendible
to other UIs (Java/Web).  It seems to me that the likely candidates for
establishing a link between either a 5250 program or a Java class, and the
supporting backend services, are data queues and CORBA.  Given that we are not
able to guarantee a V4R4 (or even V4) environment, at least for the 5250
version, that seems to whittle it right down to data queues.

So far so good?

There are a lot of facets to n-tier design, and I am interested and happy to
discuss any of them (I think).  I assume (with no particular evidence) that
somebody, if not lots of people, have worked on separating the UI from the
business logic (BL) on the AS/400 in some similar fashion, and I am looking for
ideas and reference material to achieve the best design for this implementation.

I am thinking along the lines of having a naming service that is accessed over a
data queue that invokes requested services as needed, and returns to the
requester a data queue over which to access the requested service.  It doesn't
have to be too smart, but it has the potential to be made as smart as needed.

Am I way off on this?  Who has two cents to add?

-Andrew Goodspeed
London Bridge Group
Norcross, GA  USA


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